A match made in genetic hell

Just when we thought there couldn't possibly be more developments to our TTC journey, we were hit with another.....rather remarkably large....curveball.

I got my genetic results back.
Mark and I are BOTH carriers of MCAD.
I am thinking we should go buy lottery tickets considering the odds of this happening.

Now, apparently since we are both of Northern European descent (who knew?) it is rather common to be a carrier.
1 in 70, actually.
That's like putting 140 people in a room and picking us both to have a mutation.
I always knew we were perfect for each other but this is on a whole other level.
Unfortunately, it's not a good level.

Friday morning started bright and early. I woke up at 5am and started the car while I got dressed for the gym. The cramping was more intense today, as it was ovulation day, and any time I ovulate after taking Clomid, I feel gross.
The night before I saw that Counsyl released my results to the physician, but I couldn't see them yet.
Kind of overly excited, I emailed our nurse right away (what kind of psycho emails someone at 5am....uhhh...I do, apparently) and asked if she saw the results.
I then asked if we could still schedule the IUI for later that day, pending a negative result.
I had read forums where people still moved forward with IUI's without the trigger, so I thought maybe, just maybe, we still had a chance.
Within 15 minutes, I got an email from Counsyl saying my results were ready.
I yelled FUCK rather loud, in the gym, upon reading we both were carriers.
How in the absolute fuck could this happen?
We never, in a million years, thought we would be a match. It didn't even cross our minds.
It was just a matter of getting clearance and moving forward with IUI.

And now it's not.

I got completely choked up and nearly started crying at the gym, but held back those big ass tears from dropping and finished my workout.
Angry workouts are the best, I suppose.
Once back home, Mark was getting out of the shower.
"I got my results."
He stopped dead in his tracks.
"We're a match."
"NO FUCKING WAY," he yells.
We hug. I cry. We don't know what to do.
I am completely at a loss.
This whole journey just seems like a constant uphill battle and we still aren't over the biggest hurdle yet.

It all kind of makes sense now. Not conceiving for two years.
Not even an "oops."
Perhaps we did at one point. But maybe the embryo was mutated and didn't hold on.
We'll never fully know if that was the cause, but at the same time, we are so very thankful we DIDN'T conceive, knowing what we know now.

Our only option moving forward, with our own genetics, is IVF.
IVF with PDG, to be exact. PDG is a genetic biopsy performed on the embryo that tests for a specific mutation and eliminates any that have it. Leaving us with perfect embryos.
And all of this is just darling, and we are willing to move forward, but it comes down to money.

IVF should be mostly covered with insurance, which is fantastic. But the PDG biopsy and the medication that goes along with an IVF cycle, is not.

So it kind of leaves our journey at a bit of a stand still.
I know we will always need to be on some sort of contraception when we aren't trying, because I just couldn't live with myself if somehow we did conceive and could have prevented this type of mutation on our child.
And just when I thought I was losing control over the when's and how's to TTC, in a way, we get it back.

Since this is a large process, and it's my body that has to go through all the injections and ultrasounds and grow and birth a baby, I get to choose when we go.
And I choose a spring/summer baby.
We would also get to choose the sex, to an extent, since we would basically know everything about the baby before it's even a baby in me.
I honestly have no preference, and as far as I know, I think they put one, if not two eggs back in at an attempt for one to stick.

I was chatting about all of this with a close friend, and she reminded me that at one point I flat out told her I would NEVER go the IVF route.
And if you had told me three years ago, that I would be trying and failing for two years, followed by six months of monitoring, all to find out my baby could end up mutated, and the only way to have a perfect one was to pay a ton of money via IVF...I would have packed up and ran the other way.
So life throws it to you in spurts. As much as you can handle at one time.
Then it throws a little more.
And it keeps building and building until someone tells you you only have this one, EXPENSIVE, option, and without blinking you agree.
Because you want it THAT. BAD.

And I'm not going to lie.
I absolutely thought about throwing in the towel that morning we got our results.
Because it IS. HARD. No doubt about that.

I guess I kind of feel like maybe this is God's way of testing how badly I want to have a baby, a child, a teenager, an adult...that is mine. My burden, my sacrifice, my selflessness.
Because at one point in my life, I was kind of "meh" about the whole thing.
And now it's all consuming.
If this is what it takes. Fine. Bring it on.
But it will be on our terms as we see fit.

Our new timeline is now August vs. May.
It's a long time, that I know, but it's another summer of no worry.
Actually, it will be the first summer in our new home of seriously no worries about timing, and lifestyle, and vitamins, and pee sticks, and pills, and amidoingeverythingright?!?!
We just live.
And then we go in and have science take over.

Also, I set up a GoFundMe account and there is a link on the sidebar of this blog (or click HERE) if any of you lovely readers would like to donate to help the cause. I wish we had never-ending money but the struggle is real and we aren't blessed with any trust funds or large piles of cash lying around. Thank you in advance for checking it out.

Until next time.